On July 3, At the TSG RAN#88 plenary meeting, the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) announced the freeze of Release 16 NR Specifications, marking the completion of the first evolutionary release of 5G technologies. 

Release 16 was finalized on schedule thanks to the collective hard work and close collaboration of global industries. It will further boost the confidence and resolution of industrial partners towards the continuous evolution of 5G technologies and lay a solid foundation for opening up a fully-connected, intelligent world. More than 20 standard technological features were newly added, including a series of improvements for enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) and vertical applications. These eMBB improvements cover Massive MIMO, cell interruption-free handover, and remote interference suppression. A number of technologies are also specially consolidated for vertical industries, such as ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC), NR vehicle to everything (V2X), non-public networking (NPN), and positioning. At present, 3GPP has started the R17 technical standard research and development work in full blast, preliminarily planned the main technical features and schedule of R17, and continued to enhance the evolution of the existing version of the standard;

So let's see what's different about the R16.

1. Enhancement of ultra-reliable low delay Communication (URLLC).

2.The 5GS enhances support for vertical industries and LAN services.

3. Support and expansion of cellular Internet of Things.

4. Enhance V2X support.

5. 5G positioning and positioning services.

6. UE wireless function signaling optimization.

7. 5G satellite access.

8. Support for 5G network automation architecture.

9. Wireless and wired convergence enhancement.

10. Mission-critical, Public warning, Railways and Maritime.

11. Streaming and broadcasting.

12. User authentication, multi-device support.

13. Enhanced network slice.

14. Enhance the wireless NR function.